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MARIO J. TORRES
Letter to a Commander
Mister Fidel Castro
President of Cuba.
Sir,
This is Jose Marti, who has taken the liberty of writing to you, although I
believe I have earned the attribution I have made use of, considering the
number of times you have used my name for the last 45 years.
Besides, I have decided to address you personally in this way because it
seems I am the only one who everyone believes in, respects, listens to, is
not criticized and who is not part of any sadly divided group either.
I would like to be explicit and I intend to express myself in convincing and
reflexive terms without being impulsive, which I would undoubtedly regret
although I do not know if you really deserve this kind of behavior.
We have all suffered too much and it would not be fair to end up this
process with bloodshed, revenge or violence and everything is better with
the help of good will and understanding and with the expected reasoning that
God may finally grant us.
I lived in this realm, as is known, in the second half of the century before
last, even more than 100 years and according to my actions and writings, I
had a mission that left unended when I left but in my new change, I always
trusted it would be fulfilled in the long run and even more when I saw you
arrive, moment in which I thought your mission was inevitably to finish mine
but with the passing of the years I sadly found out it was not the way I
hoped it would be; on the contrary I could, in great despair, witness the
total destruction of my beloved island and how my homeland and its people
were crazily taken to most cruel abyss and with the aggravating fact of
having used my name as a banner and all this disgrace has led me to wander
as a zombie between heaven and earth without a second of deserved peace for
more than a century.
Sometimes I doubt if at any given moment you really desired the well-being
and the freedom awaited for centuries of our Homeland or if you confused it
with personal greatness, the stubbornness of never yielding, with the
delights of the power of a Caribbean Neo emperor or with the call of
almighty and "know-it-all" of "Commander in Chief", but if in fact, the
formerly stated was ever valid, I urge you to think it over and in silence
meditate, impartially and without including in your analysis the influence
or guilt of any neighboring country nor anything of the sort, that if you
think twice about it , has never taken us seriously, maybe for seeing us as
too insignificant. I invite you to analyze if you have done good or bad to
your people, if they suffer for your responsibility or not, if they live
happily or undergo a life in death or if they really die on account of you
and if it is worth while insisting in keeping a nonsense power at such a
high price and I have the hope you finally realize that if so many suffer,
are unforgivenly imprisoned, half dead or tortured for your rule or either
die, are separate, drowned in the sea, starve to death and undergo misery,
it has to do indeed with the tenacious stubbornness of your ideas.
Besides, have you ever stopped to think, has your conscience been moved or
affected or have you had remorse and you have not said it on the serious
tragedy of so many women, children, old people and why not men drowned in
the sea,just for the sake of escaping from you!?
What country's president would like to see his race degraded, marked by his
regime or fleeing all over the world?
What ruler of which country would like that? Have you ever noticed that
something must be going wrong, and so wrong that people would rather die in
the sea than share the island with you?
You have to have principles in these cases and not hide them with false and
originally utopic theories. Other ordinary people in everyday situations
hang themselves for even less than what you have done or because they did
not get what they wanted or because they are despised.
Do you like to be called "dictator"?, but well, going round the bend, this
is what you have turned into, and everyone inside the island already whisper
it and out of it you can hear it out loud.
I think you have never analyzed or criticized yourself and therefore have
not realized what has become out of you. Is it good to become a hedious Mr.
Hyde? Is it good to know one does more harm than good? The doubtful
achievements you allege in Education and Public Health are not worth
mentioning because they are darkened in the balance of your injustice and
political imposition. He, who is good, is totally good, not half good or in
change of a pay. Besides, I am sure you know the world is not perfect and it
will never be and I myself can tell you about it because I am already here
and I know that you and your people are in a valley of fulfillment, so do
not try to fix it by making it even worse.
Have you also realized that you already compete with the "fuhrer" in the
"concentration camp" thing but yours having the sea as barbed wire? Do not
get upset if I declare you a follower of the Reich's fanaticism in the
obstinacy of your ideas.
Recognize that men get tired and retire from their jobs and yours has been a
real exhausting one and at your age you must be pretty tired and in need of
a different relief and besides you can always do it with the good record of
the oldest regime in History. Lower that fever since for a very long time
everything for you has been a self-deceit. Do not respond with hollow coarse
slogans or nasty offensive words since all know these do not have the
desired effect.
Finally, make your followers recognize, as in the story of the king without
a costume, that you are naked. If you laid your sight towards Miami, you
would see everyone has been gone and those who have not are bribed,
blackmailed or bought by you or simply they have not been able to make it.
do not be stubborn and show your intelligence. This must be a call to the
center of the midnight of your conscience and that your decision, God
willing, may still give you a final opportunity of not falling deeper into
the trash can of history you so much refer to, even worse remembered than
Adolph, many other dictators or declared enemies of mankind.
The majority of the people would prefer to solve the problem this way rather
than applying a destructive "eye by eye" policy in our country. From these
heights I am sure that everyone would accept this for the price of the so
much awaited welfare. There are many places available in the world to live
where you may be able to make use of your savings, which I, by the way,
daresay are not minimal and I would then dedicate myself to help my people
reconstruct rather than urge them to live in resentment.
This is a Cuban to Cuban exchange, without any guilty "Yankee" or "Mafia"
standing in the middle. I am addressing you as your experienced ancestor who
really never spoke to you or even less guided you when you said you thought
I was but now I do indeed try to do it because I cannot close my eyes before
all this tragedy.
This is too much. What for more?
It is still time to retire with a sort of strange honor many would
appreciate since the desire of normality and prosperous reunion is so
enormous that many would ignore this.
Remember that nobody is eternal in this realm of fulfillment and it is
better to be remembered as a gentle knight even though in a final bow than
as a mean selfish monster.
Retire NOW commander and you will do good to me in Heaven and to millions on
Earth. Think about it seriously!
Respectfully,
JOSE MARTI
MARIO J TORRES
JANUARY 2004
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